Disqus is for Conversing not for Throwing

Do you have a challenge keeping up with all social media tools? I certainly do. And maybe I need help.

Clearly I’m somewhat in overload, going by an experience this morning of trying to subscribe to one and finding I was already subscribed. In fact, when I got them to send me my password and then logged in, I found I had set up my profile there, with a photo and the usual “about me” stuff.

I also realised I didn’t have much more than a slight clue about what the service does or why I joined – other than the usual combination of fascination with bright, shiny things and a fear of missing out on the cool new app.

There was also the challenge of not knowing how to pronounce the name of the application, Disqus.

My inclination was to pronounce that like the thing that gets thrown, the discus, which I thought was a fair guess.

But no, it’s supposed to be pronounced like that thing that mature, consenting adults do, i.e. “discuss”.

Disqus, pronounced “discuss”, is a service and tool for web comments and discussions. The Disqus comment system can be plugged into any website, blog, or application. Disqus makes commenting easier and more interactive, while connecting websites and commenters across a thriving discussion community.

So far, so good. But what does that really mean? What was I supposed to do with this tool and what benefits would it deliver?

I knew, mainly from what I’d read on Twitter, that several people I respect spoke positively about Disqus, so rather than spending time hunting around for a guide, I would work through what was on the site. Experiential learning. Or reckless experimenting, depending on your point of view.

Anyway, as a next step I went back and checked the website and found that I could apparently do two things:

The next screen gave me a set of platform options: WordPress, MovableType, Typepad, Blogger and “generic”.

I had read positive things about the WordPress plugin, so clicked there and went through the usual processes of uploading, installing and configuring the plugin. There are a number of options, under the several headings/tabs of Moderate, Settings, Tools and Permissions. I’ve been through to do some basic configuration, including setting moderation permissions as on for all comments.

I’m wondering whether the moderation permission options are adequate for me, or retrogressive for this blog. The situation till now has been that once people have had a comment approved, subsequent comments from those people are not moderated automatically. But that option does not seem to be available with Disqus. As the screenshot below shows, the permission options are:

No – i.e. no moderation

from unregistered people (which presumably means people who have registered as readers – very few do this)

from everyone

I’m not sure how Disqus could fix this, but I believe it would be in their interest to do so: I quite like the idea that people who have had a comment approved should be trusted to leave non-spammy, non-inappropriate comments in future, without their having to be moderated each time.

There is also a widget to highlight commenters: I’ve installed that. And a Seesmic configuration, which means that people can leave Seesmic-enabled video comments. Maybe even Loic would care to leave a video comment! That would be nice.

Back for a moment to that personal page on the Disqus site. I find it somewhat disconcerting that on that page now are displayed, in excerpt fashion, a bunch of posts from this blog from April this year then going back. Nothing more recent. Also the leading post is from what was meant to be a private page. Mysterious. Maybe there is a refresh coming up which will bring the data up to more recent postings.

I regard this installation as an experiment and my priority is for user convenience over other issues such as possible increased traffic. So I welcome feedback, positive or negative.

Update: I’ve de-activated Disqus, for the time being at least – see my comment below of August 28, 2008

Des Walsh is a business coach and social media strategist. He helps owners of small and medium business meet confidently the special challenges of this age of rapid transformation, deliver great results and stay balanced and happy in the process. Des has been actively engaged for over 20 years in promoting the business opportunities of the digital economy, is a certified specialist in social media strategy, a blogger, podcaster and co-author of the best-selling book LinkedIn for Recruiting.

I'm using it on my blog as well – the only irritating thing I've noticed is that some themes do not play well with the comments (showing comment counts, links to comments form, etc). Likely more the fault of the themes than anything else though

I'm using it on my blog as well – the only irritating thing I've noticed is that some themes do not play well with the comments (showing comment counts, links to comments form, etc). Likely more the fault of the themes than anything else though

Update: I’ve de-activated this plugin. System was down last week; have a message that keeps telling me the installation is out of date and to visit the Disqus blog for an update but when I visit the blog I can’t see any info about an update; there is a forum but I don’t have time to read through all the posts to see if someone else is having this problem. But what really bothers me is that in using Disqus I’m evidently handing over my comments to their database. So I’ve decided to switch back to the regular WordPress system.

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